


Things To Do

by Ladycat



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Gen, Illnesses, Post-Apocalypse, human!Angel, ish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-12
Updated: 2014-02-12
Packaged: 2018-01-12 03:42:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1181466
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ladycat/pseuds/Ladycat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Neither of them said anything until the coughing finally settled with a wet, chest-seizing rattle. The breathing that followed was loud, harsh, and Xander's mind told him that it would be fetid -- sick-sour. "You've tried antibiotics?"</p>
            </blockquote>





	Things To Do

Alcohol. Lots of it. Soon, if possible. Xander rubbed the left side of his forehead, feeling dry, paper-thin skin. He'd long mastered the art of never touching the eye patch when he did this. "Tell me you have something brain-cell killing?"

He asked the world at large, but there was a creak and a clink and then something mostly cold was settled by his arm. "Rotgut," a rough, guttural voice said. "It works."

Xander drank without looking. Ah, those fabulous Harris genes, giving him the ability to down something paint-thinner would feel snooty towards with barely a wince or a cough. "So ... pure alcohol?"

"Close. Vamp-constitution, after all. Not like two beers works."

His eyes opened just in time to see a dirty, smoke-smudged Spike twist his mouth into something that, years ago, would have been a smirk. Now... Ten years, on and off, Xander had known Spike. For Xander to no longer be the bright-eyed, bouncy brat he'd been in high school, well. That was just natural, no matter how much it sucked.

Eight and a half years and Spike hadn't aged a day. Xander trusted that memory, if not much else. The Spike before him, though, was old. A year and a half had melded with all the timeless years he'd walked.

It was worse than watching new creases appear in Giles' face. Much worse.

A rattling cough rose up, shaking through the rafters so hard that Xander could almost feel the dust that should have fallen loose. "Often?"

"Near enough. Tuberculosis, my guess. It was common, back when."

Back when he was human. Back before he was _Angelus_ , long before he'd ever converted to _Angel_. Back when he was Liam, no last name. He refused to turn that over and Spike claimed not even Darla learned that tidbit.

Neither of them said anything until the coughing finally settled with a wet, chest-seizing rattle. The breathing that followed was loud, harsh, and Xander's mind told him that it would be fetid -- sick-sour. "You've tried antibiotics?"

The place wasn't a hovel, but it was damned close. The floor was practically see through, walls climbing with mold and god knew what else. Spiderwebs feathered over holes that let in air acrid with pollution. Disgusting. Decrepit. Just sitting in it made Xander want to scrub himself clean, and he'd been in far, far worse.

Spike had the grace to look uncomfortable, before shrugging. "Believe what you want, but the Thai aren't real big on doling out charity."

He could've mentioned his week-ago spree in purchasing bottles that burst with pills he couldn't get in the states -- or even England -- without paying an arm and a leg. Or at all. Things got banned, rules changed, perceptions altered, but certain places still churned them out, knowing someone would be there to buy it. Xander took advantage of that as often as he could; side-effects weren't normally a concern, in his line of work. Especially cumulative ones.

"Why the hell do you stay here?" The ache wasn't audible, yet. He made sure of that. "Thailand... not a good place for vampires."

"Sure it is, pet." A flash of the old Spike resurrected, mirror-ball brilliant and just as plastic and tacky. "Pretty little boys with their dicks tucked away, all the alcohol a bloke could drink -- what more could you ask for?"

The first time Xander had spotted him, framed by glittering robes and more gold than the human eye could tolerate, red ribbons making the whole thing just _that_ much more jarring, Spike had been falling down drunk. It'd taken him a moment to piece together the bleached asshole with a _familiar_ bleached asshole, and by then, Xander was by his side. He'd stunk from drink, booze permeating skin stretched far too tight over prominent bones, the words Spike had always prided above all else unintelligible even when he'd managed to get the syllables straight. And his eyes ...

He didn't look much better now, although he was sober. More sober, at least. Xander had seen to that. "If I go out this morning, get some drugs -- will you be here when I get back?"

"Poor fucking Scooby. He's stomped on your heart near as much as I have, but still you go grubbing for little white pills for him. He wouldn't thank you for it."

"And if I were doing it for gratitude, I might care. Yes or no, Spike." It was hard to keep the heat down. He was older, now. Memories and experiences all tangled up with exhausted responsibility hung over him like anchors, iron and lead keeping him slow. Only physical threats got him active, now.

Except when it came to Spike. Always and forever.

Eyes like shattered crystals looked up at him, red-rimmed. It hurt to be the focus of that stare. "Angel's not going anywhere like this. Too sick."

There were streamers all around the open area that acted as living room and kitchen both, left over from the bar Xander'd found him in and weeks of nightly visits before. The fridge wheezed as it processed freon, the door rusted enough that it had to be propped closed. Pollution hazed the air, human sick and filth adding another patina, but Xander had no illusions about it coming _just_ from Angel. Liam. Whoever he was now.

Xander'd spent time in a slum. They didn't vary much.

He made himself hold Spike's gaze, remembering the way pretty girls had flinched whenever Spike had looked up. There was something _wrong_ in those eyes. "That's not what I asked, Spike."

It wasn't. It was a question Xander'd never wanted to ask again, setting himself up for something he'd sworn he'd outgrown. But sitting here, looking out ... it wasn't pity for Angel that kept him. Angel was sick, lost in a disease he had no immunities to fight. He deserved sympathy. _Succor_ , to use a word it'd taken Xander years to truly understand.

Spike, though. Spike deserved pity. Because Spike could've left, could've made himself anything -- demon lord, night vigilante, hell: rich, recluse eccentric; he knew all the tricks, all the rolls to throw. He could've been alone. But instead he lived in squalor, drinking himself stupid and fucking pretty boys that never had soft, almost shaggy hair, all their shoulders narrower than Spike's own. Instead, he did what he could to keep Angel well, or at least alive -- Xander had seen the bedroom, the sharing and hints of fumbling, clumsy care. Xander had no illusions on how Spike got most of his money, either; Spike probably told himself he enjoyed it.

Anyone else would have left. No soul was worth this, as legions of warm, decrepit bodies could attest. But Spike was _there_. He'd stayed.

Because he was useless. Lost. Broken, in ways Angel with all his rattling coughs couldn't approach.

But then, hadn't that always been the way of it?

"Be here, Spike." Xander forced himself to lay a hand on wood that might've been fine, a hundred years ago when it'd first been sanded smooth. The grains were rough, and tacky -- spilled alcohol, of course. Not blood. "Be here when I get back."

"Ordering me around again?" Spike rasped.

"Yeah, Spike. I am."

Eyes locked on the table, Spike waited until Angel convulsed his way through another bout. "Right," he muttered. He didn't flinch when Xander covered his hand -- and he didn't pull away, either. As far as Xander was concerned, that was a fucking leap.

He'd forgotten what those felt like.


End file.
